Shelter in a Soldier's Arms (7 page)

“Maggie’s father couldn’t even find the clean diapers to change her,” she said, “and he sure wouldn’t be able to get her ready for school. How do you know how to do all this?”

“I had help from Brenda. She’s raised four kids of her own and has a couple of grandchildren. Besides, compared to an antiterrorist campaign, running your life is easy.”

“It’s anything but that for me,” she murmured, thinking it was not possible for their worlds to be more different. “Anything else?”

“Yes. Maggie’s class is taking a field trip to the zoo next Friday. The permission slip had to be back yesterday for Maggie to go, so I signed it. Is that all right?”

Ashley sighed. “Of course. I’d meant to take care of that last week. I guess with her being sick and everything else that happened, I just forgot. She would have been heartbroken to miss the trip.”

She studied her host. He wasn’t just physically strong and a little scary, he was also incredibly competent. She needed that in her life right now, and the urge to let him take over and handle everything nearly overwhelmed her. No one had been around to look out for her since she was twelve.

A nice fantasy, she told herself, but one that had no basis in reality. The truth was she was an employee of Jeff Ritter. For reasons that still weren’t clear to her, he’d taken her and her daughter and was making them feel very welcome in his beautiful home. But gracious or not, he was a stranger with a past that made her more than a little nervous.

“You’ve been really terrific,” she said, then took a drink of coffee. “I’m feeling a lot better today. I’m sure that I’ll be a hundred percent tomorrow and then we’ll be out of your hair.” She cleared her throat. “Would it be too much trouble to have someone bring my car here?”

Jeff studied her for a long time. As usual, not a flicker of thought or emotion showed in his steel-gray eyes. He could have been planning sixty-seven ways to kill her with household appliances or deciding on a second cup of coffee. She really hoped it was the latter.

She returned the scrutiny, noting the short, blond hair brushed back from his face and the high cheekbones. He was tall, muscled and extremely good-looking. So why did he live alone in this gorgeous house? Was there a former Mrs. Ritter somewhere? Or was Jeff not the marrying kind? She bit her lower lip. As closemouthed and mysterious as he seemed, she could understand his avoiding a long-term commitment. Was there a series of significant girlfriends? And more importantly, why did she care?

Before she could come up with an answer to the question, he spoke.

“I’m glad you’re feeling better, but getting over the flu is no reason to rush off.”

His voice was low and well modulated. Controlled, she thought. Everything about him was controlled.

“I think it would be better if we left,” she told him.

“Why? Do you really want Maggie living in a shelter until your apartment is fixed?”

Of course she didn’t. It wasn’t anyone’s dream of a housing situation, but she didn’t have a choice. “Maggie is resilient. She’ll be fine.”

“Agreed, but I don’t see the need to expose her to that. Why not stay here until your housing problem is resolved? There’s plenty of room. You won’t be in the way.”

“But you don’t know us. We’re not family. I don’t understand why you’re—”

His pager went off before she could finish her sentence. Jeff glanced at the screen of the tiny machine, then rose to his feet. “I have to leave,” he told her. “Try to get plenty of rest so you can build up your strength.”

Before she could say anything else, he’d grabbed his suit jacket from its place on the spare chair and left the room. Seconds later she heard a door close as he walked into the garage.

“How convenient,” she muttered, nearly convinced he’d somehow arranged for his pager to go off at that exact moment. Which was crazy. Even someone like Jeff couldn’t do that.

She finished her breakfast, then cleaned the kitchen. After wiping down the counters for the second time, she figured she might as well take a look at the rest of the house before she began studying.

Not Jeff’s bedroom or anything private, but just to get a lay of the land.

Jeff had made it clear they were welcome to stay until her apartment was fixed. Which could be a few more days. If she got more comfortable in his house, she might be more comfortable with the man. After all he’d been right about the shelter. It would be far better for Maggie to stay here than to move again.

She wandered through the main floor of the house. There was a large, formal living room with floor-to-ceiling glass windows overlooking the lake. The furniture was expensive, well made and completely impersonal. Her initial impression had been dead-on. There weren’t any personal effects anywhere.

The dining room’s cherry table could seat twelve, but Ashley had the feeling no one had ever eaten on it. In the family room she found state-of-the-art entertainment equipment, but no books or compact discs. The only movies were the ones he’d rented with Maggie.

Ashley paused in the center of the oversize room. The sectional sofa sat opposite the wide-screen television. There weren’t any photographs or paintings. Nothing personal. Who was Jeffrey Ritter and why did he live like this? It was as if he had no past—but instead had appeared fully-grown. Was he estranged from his family? Were they dead? There weren’t even any trophies of war. Maybe he had a secret vault somewhere with all that personal stuff.

The thought should have made her smile, but instead she shuddered as if brushed by a chill. Again the question came to her mind. Who was Jeff?

Ashley shook her head. She decided she didn’t want or need an answer. She wasn’t looking for a man in her life, and if she was, Jeff wouldn’t make the final cut. While he was efficient, thorough and even kind, he wasn’t warm and loving. She was only interested in someone who would love her with body, heart and soul. She wasn’t even sure Jeff had a soul.

Which meant she should be grateful for his hospitality and should stop analyzing the man. After all, if he let her stay until her apartment was ready, it meant she could take a minivacation from the trauma that was her life. As her mother used to say, if someone offers you a gift, take it. If you don’t like it, you can always exchange it later.

Ť^ť

Ashley spent most of the day studying and sleeping. Around three, the sitter, one of Maggie’s preschool teachers, dropped off her daughter.

“Tell me about your day,” she said when the sitter had left after refusing payment.

“Cathy read us a whole book and I colored in the number book and we talked about our trip to the zoo next week.” Maggie shared the bounty of her experiences over a tuna sandwich.

Ashley listened with half an ear, all the while trying to figure out how to raise the issue of payment with her host. It was one thing to stay in his house, but it was quite another for him to take financial responsibility for Maggie’s child care. It’s not as if he were the girl’s father. In fact, Damian had never once contributed a penny. She rubbed her temples. Thinking about Damian would only make her sad and frustrate her in equal measures, so she wouldn’t. And she vowed to talk to Jeff later about him paying for things that he shouldn’t.

Maggie swallowed her mouthful of food. “Mommy, are you coming with us to the zoo?” her daughter asked. “Cathy said we need extra grown-ups and I couldn’t ‘member if you have school.”

Blue eyes stared beseechingly. Ashley couldn’t help smiling, then touching her daughter’s cheek. “I don’t have classes, and if Cathy needs help I would be delighted to come along. I love seeing all the animals at the zoo.”

“Do they gots kittens?”

“Maybe some really big ones.”

“I wish Uncle Jeff had kittens.”

“I know you do, sweetie, but he doesn’t.” She hesitated, not sure how to find out if her daughter was comfortable without scaring her by the question. “Do you miss our apartment?”

“A little.”

Maggie drank her milk. The clips Jeff had put in her hair that morning were still crooked. Still, it had been very sweet of him to try.

“I like staying here with Uncle Jeff,” Maggie volunteered. “He’s very nice.” She gave her mother an innocent smile. “Uncle Jeff likes cake. We could make him one.”

Ashley couldn’t help wondering how much her daughter’s generosity had to do with her own affection for the dessert. Although baking something would be a nice gesture, a small thank-you for his kindnesses. She could even make dinner. Her car had been delivered earlier that afternoon. They could make a quick trip to the store and get everything they’d need.

“You know, munchkin,” she said, lifting her daughter down from her chair and tapping the tip of her nose, “that’s a very good idea. Let me call Jeff’s office and see what time he’s going to be home. Then we can make a special cake and a special dinner for him.”

She found the business card he’d left her and called his office. When she was put through to Brenda, she asked his assistant what time he would be heading home. Brenda put her on hold while she checked with him. As Ashley listened to the soft music, she had the sudden thought that this was all too weird. Would he think she was cooking for him to capture his interest? The way to a man’s heart and all that?

Heat flared on her cheeks. She longed to hang up, but it was too late for that. Brenda already knew it was her on the line. She would have to say that she was offering a thank-you and nothing more.

“He said he’ll be home at six-thirty,” Brenda announced cheerfully.

“Ah, thanks.” Ashley wanted to explain but doubted Jeff’s assistant cared one way or the other. She hung up and started her shopping list. She would make sure that Jeff understood everything when he got home.

*

The chocolate cake turned out perfectly. Maggie insisted on helping with the frosting, which meant there were uneven patches and more sticky chocolate on her arms and face than on the cake itself. Ashley had settled on meat loaf for dinner. It was easy and something most people liked. Plus she had a limited supply of cash that wasn’t going to cover anything expensive, such as steaks.

She checked the potatoes and steaming green beans, then glanced at the clock. Jeff was due any second.

“Just enough time to get you cleaned up, young lady,” she said, taking the rubber spatula from her daughter’s hand and urging her toward the sink.

Just then Ashley heard the door to the garage open. Unexpectedly her heart rate doubled and her throat seemed to close up a little.

His footsteps sounded on the wood floor. She froze in the center of the kitchen, not sure if she should dash for cover or brazenly stand her ground and greet him. The confusion didn’t make any sense. Why was she suddenly nervous? Nothing had changed.

Jeff entered the kitchen. He glanced at the pots on the stove, at the cake, then looked at Maggie, covered in chocolate frosting and grinning.

“We made you a surprise,” the four-year-old announced.

“I can see that,” he told her, and turned his attention to Ashley. “How do you feel?”

She swallowed. It was as if he could see through to her soul, she thought, wondering if she would melt under the intensity of his attention. Heat flared again, but this time it wasn’t just on her face. Instead her entire body felt hot. As if she’d just stepped into a sauna.

“Better, thanks,” she said, hoping her voice sounded more steady than she felt. “I, ah, slept a lot, and studied. The worst of the virus is over.” She forced herself to smile, then motioned to the stove. “I made dinner.”

“You said you were going to when you called Brenda.”

She ducked her head. “Yes, well, I didn’t think before I called. I’m sorry. That was really dumb.”

“Why?”

She glanced at him from under her lashes. She had a sudden awareness of him as a man. Had his shoulders always been that broad? Why hadn’t she noticed before? Was it her illness? Had the flu blunted his effect on her, and if so, how could she get immunized against Jeff Ritter’s appeal?

“Ashley?”

She blinked. Oh. He asked her a question. Yeah. Dinner. Why cooking it was dumb. “I didn’t want you to feel obligated to come home.”

One corner of his mouth quirked up. “I live here.”

“I know that. I meant for dinner. You might have plans, or not want to eat with us. The cake was Maggie’s idea.” She glanced down at her daughter and saw that her four-year-old was following the conversation with undisguised interest.

He smiled at the girl. “It’s a beautiful cake. Thank you.”

Maggie brightened. “It’s really good. Mommy won’t let me eat the batter ‘cause of eggs, but I licked the frosting and it’s perfect.”

“Good.” He looked back at her. “So what’s for dinner?”

“Meat loaf. Mashed potatoes and gravy. Green beans.”

“Sounds great. Let me go wash up and I’ll join you.”

“You will?”

“Unless you don’t want me to.”

She forced herself to take a deep breath. “No. It would be nice to have you eat with us. Really.”

He nodded and left the room. Ashley groaned softly. When had she turned into an idiot? Just this morning she’d had a completely normal conversation with the man. Now she was acting like a freshman with a crush on the football captain. She’d lost her mind, and if she wanted to act like a mature adult, she was going to have to find it again, and fast!

*

Jeff focused on the report in front of him but he couldn’t force any of the words to make sense. He would swear that even from half a house away, he could hear laughter drifting down the stairs and into his study. Earlier he’d heard running water as Ashley prepared her daughter’s bath. The nightly routine was as foreign to him as life on another planet, and yet observing it from a distance made him ache inside.

He wanted with a power that nearly drove him to his knees, yet he couldn’t for the life of him say what he wanted. Connection had never been his strength. Hadn’t Nicole told him that dozens of times before she’d left him? Hadn’t she hurled the accusation across nearly every argument they’d had? That he’d changed, that he wasn’t the man she’d married, that he didn’t belong?